Tuesday, January 1, 2013

Bye Bye Christmas and Hello 2013 !

I had a nice little work break over Christmas. It was crazy busy and relaxing, if you can make sense of that. I went with my two kids to New York City for the day on the 21st. We walked and shopped, and shopped and walked. I love that city!. We got home late and the very next day almost 60 family members came to our house for the annual 'Cuzzin Christmas'. Hosting that party every year gets me to decorate. We kept it simple this year, at least I thought so. It looked like plenty, though, when I piled everything on the dining room table before packing it away.

When I was a teenager, my mom started giving me a Wallace silver bell each year. I have 38 of them now. Some years I just pile them all in a basket and some times they go on the tree. This year I hung a bunch of them from the banister that you see when you come through our front door.

I added a simple glass garland and several bows. The rest of the bells went on our tree. The tree was covered with white lights and had a smattering of the bells. That's it. Very serene and relaxing to look at.

We have an antique hutch in the kitchen and for the last two years, it has been the setting for a funny collection of plastic vintage nativities. You can read about why and how I got them here.

I haven't gotten any more since that wild ebay escapade but there will certainly be more. They REALLY make me happy, and I have no idea why. And I'm starting to believe that plastic doesn't get the respect that it deserves.

Here's my big Christmas wallhanging. It's a Mackenna Ryan pattern. You can see some closeups here. I know there's another post with more pics but darned if I could find it. I have a little confession to tell. I put this quilt up last Christmas and never took it down. Hey! No judging. Who says holiday art can't hang all year. It is coming down this year though. I think I'm going to finish my yellow spiral half square triangle piece into a wallhanging and put it there.

And now for 2013.

A resolution is a 'formal expression of intention.'

I would hereby like to put into writing a resolution or two.

As always, I will start with UFO's. Yeah yeah and blah blah. I have too many UFO's sitting around. Seriously, who cares? It's a rare quilter who doesn't have some. However, I have a few that I would like to see finished. Let's start with the 'Orb'. Boy was I stoked when I started this quilt. It was going to be one of my Masterpieces. Then I took a wrong turn or two. First, the black doesn't do it for me. Not much I can do about that now. Second, the center circles are appliqued.......with satin stitch. Ack! What was I thinking? I don't even like satin stitch. Anyway, I stalled when I tried to figure out a border. I want to use lots of the colored fabrics but many are almost gone. I just know for sure that I want to tone down the black.﻿

Next, this is a fun wonky churndash that started with the 15 Minutes of Play blog. The centers of the blocks are 4 inch blocks of 'made' fabric and some small orphan pieces. The top is actually twice this size as it is folded in half. I was undecided on whether or not to add a border so it languished. I like it the way it is and may just get going with the finishing.

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And the last of the UFO's is my 'Citrus' quilt.. Get it? Huh? Yellow, orange, and green are citrus colors. And these blocks kinda look like orange slices don't they? Anyway, I started this at the end of 2009 when I joined the Don't Look Now Quiltalong. The wedges are all hand appliqued, there are twelve per block, and I have 36 blocks done. That's 432 wedges. For a while, I couldn't stop working on this and I had some mighty sore fingers. I have a lot more wedges in a box which is good because I'll need them when I put these circles together. The BIG question is............whether to join them by hand or machine? Sigh, I know it should be hand done, and I know that if I do it by machine, it will bug me. Bigger sigh.

So resolution number 1 is to finish those three UFO's by the end of 2013.